


The mark of a Soulmate (and the scar that came with it)

by cherrylng



Category: Coldplay (Band), Muse (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, First Kiss, Fluff, Humor, Imprinting, Kissing, M/M, Romance, Romantic Soulmates, Scars, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-26
Updated: 2017-05-26
Packaged: 2018-11-05 05:18:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11006793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cherrylng/pseuds/cherrylng
Summary: The mark of a soulmate is, as cliché as it sounds, a special thing. The moment that the mark comes to a person’s existence is an unforgettable moment. For Matt, the mark on the left hand side of his collarbone can fool anyone into thinking that it’s a tattoo.And right above his mark, on his neck, is that of a gnarly looking scar.





	The mark of a Soulmate (and the scar that came with it)

The mark of a soulmate is, as cliché as it sounds, a special thing. The moment that the mark comes to a person’s existence is an unforgettable moment. What the mark will appear as varies with each individual. For Matt, the mark on the left hand side of his collarbone is a pretty and cool looking one, with an appearance that can fool anyone into thinking that it’s a tattoo.   
  
His mark is that of a flock of flying birds in black, seven in total and all of the birds flying in a horizontal V-shape, with the tip facing to the right.   
  
And right above his mark, on his neck, is that of a gnarly looking scar.   
  
Matt didn’t get the scar from some horrific accident or whatnot. It just appeared one day out of the blue, and unlike his soulmate mark, the scar didn’t exactly arrived on him without problems coming with it.  
  
The day his mark came into existence was on his tenth birthday, the age that most people have their marks appear. The scar happened a few months later. When the scar first appeared one morning, Matt thought that he had a bad case of the rash on his neck, itching bad enough that it got his mum worried and she took him out of school for a day to bring him to see a doctor.   
  
It was the doctor who, after applying some balm to soothe the itch on the afflicted area and gave a cream to help with the inflamed area, then explained to Matt and his mum that he is completely fine, and so is his soulmate.   
  
That is when Matt finds out for the first time that when damage is done on the mark of a soulmate or near the area around it, the disfigurements are copied over to the other soulmate, although it’s merely a copy rather than being caused by actual external inflicted damage.  
  
He didn’t get to ask what might have happened to his soulmate before mum dragged him out of the doctor’s room, more than relieved that he’s okay and to not touch the spot until it’s done healing itself.  
  
A week later, once the itch has gone away, the tissues on his neck are healed over and it has been there since then. Or rather, to be more accurate, the skin tissues simply rearranged itself. Matt has often taken a good look at it by the mirror. It’s faint, like a poor imitation of an actual scar, but visible if taken a good look at it. He kinda likes it, sometimes more so than his mark. It makes the idea of his soulmate being around somewhere in the world much more real.   
  
As a kid, that got Matt interested into studying the phenomena of soulmate marks and the variations that has been recorded down in history. Even as he grew up, his interest for it did not waned. It just didn’t stop gnawing at his curiosity and trying to figure out what was the cause of the scar. What the hell happened to his soulmate? And at just the age when Matt only recently had his mark? It’s a question that he carried with him as he grew up.   
  
His family were bothered by the sight of the scar at first, worried and discussing quietly of what happened to his other half, of what must have caused it. But they eventually got over when they see that he isn’t bothered by it or have negative feelings towards what is on his neck.  
  
At times, however, both the mark and the scar annoy him. It’s not that he doesn’t like his mark or the scar that came along with it, in fact he loves them. The problem is when people ask too many questions to him about it. About how the scar came from, about whether or not he knows what happened to the soulmate that he has yet to meet.  
  
He doesn’t know all the answers, especially when he has not found his soulmate yet. He didn’t asked for the universe to make finding his soulmate be this difficult, and to have others try to pry on something personal and private to him.  
  
It makes him envious towards those whose marks make it easier to find their soulmate, such as his best friend Chris, whose mark is that of the first words that he'll hear from his soulmate, which he did in the form of Kelly. And not so envious of Dom’s which is one half of an intricate puzzle which his soulmate has the other half.   
  
It is not as if Matt is willing to spend his formative years as a teen remaining single for the sake of his soulmate, as he had seen or heard a few of his schoolmates done. He had a girlfriend and a serious relationship for a start.  
  
He and Tanya are not soulmates, with her mark being that of hexagonal geometric patterns set around in a circle on her right wrist. It looked pretty cool to him. They may not be soulmates to one another, but they liked it each other enough to settle into a relationship that lasted a few years. The time he spent with Tanya was not a smooth road, but it was a steady one that they enjoyed for years.   
  
For a time, Matt thought that the two of them would become serious about going the next few steps, up until she found her soulmate. When she confesses it to Matt, they had a few, long discussions before they finally agreed to end their relationship. She loves Matt, and he felt it as well, but meeting Tanya’s soulmate himself had Matt see that her love for him couldn't hold a candle over to the love that she felt for her soulmate. It wasn't fair to keep one’s heart torn from the choice between one over the other.  
  
The best thing out of it is that she found her soulmate who will love her as she always wanted, even though it caused Matt’s heart to be hurt and become lonely at his young adulthood. They’ll still stay as friends, at least.  
  
He’s written lyrics about his curiosity and wondering of his soulmate before, even wrote a song about what if his relationship with Tanya could have went on had she never met her soulmate, but never dare put it into song. After all, there’s tons of songs talking about one’s soulmate that can fit his mood and thoughts. It felt too personal to him to dare show the lyrics to the radio and the audience, much less his own bandmates. There were raw emotions behind the words written down.   
  
If he and his best friends are still having the band continue on in the years ahead of them, maybe he’ll have the confidence by then to record it for an album.  
  
\-----  
  
One day, while taking a smoke at a garden in an out of the way pub, Dom plops down next to him.  
  
“Bells, got time to have a talk with me?”  
  
Matt gives a shrug, not feeling talkative but not really minding if someone just wants him to listen.  
  
“I got a hypothetical question for you,” Dom says. “If someone found your soulmate, would you want to meet them?”  
  
Matt almost drops his cigarette. No, no, don’t react to that so quickly, he mentally chastises himself. There’s no way that Dom somehow found his soulmate, the other half that he yearns to meet.  
  
“Depends,” Matt answers, keeping it short and cryptic.   
  
Dom hums, pulling a cigarette out, lighting it, and take a few puffs before he continues.  
  
“And what if I tell you that your soulmate is a bloke?”  
  
Matt pauses for a second before he turns to Dom with an eyebrow raised.  
  
He’s heard that question one too many times before, one that he isn’t sure how to answer it. He never really questioned if his soulmate is a man or a woman, but a large part of him had often expected them to be a gal. To hear Dom say that his soulmate might be a guy in an ever so casual manner brings suspicion to the forefront of his mind.   
  
It could either mean that the drummer is pulling off a mean joke at him, or that he really has found Matt’s soulmate and he knows who it is.  
  
“You’re very specific about my soulmate being a bloke for a reason there, Dom.”  
  
“But you’re tempted to ask who is it from me.”  
  
Matt sighs.   
  
“Fine. Who do you think it might be?” he finally asks.  
  
The edges of Dom’s lips curled up into a grin.  
  
“You know about that band that I talked about the gig that I last went to? The one called Coldplay?” Matt nods. “I met the guys after the show and I _saw_ it, Matt. I knew he could be your soulmate. Name of the bloke is Chris, the lead singer of the band.”  
  
Matt’s face scrunches up in disbelief. His heart may be beating fast in excitement but he doesn’t want to get his hopes up immediately. That gig was more than a week ago and it’s only _now_ that Dom decided to mention to him about having found his potential soulmate?  
  
“And why do you think that he might the one? What did you see to be sure of it?” he questions.  
  
Dom takes a pull at his cigarette before blowing smoke out of his nostrils. He then takes the cigarette out with his fingers and points it to Matt’s neck.  
  
“He has a scar on his neck, one that looks exactly like yours.”  
  
Matt takes a pause. Subconsciously, his hand went up to his neck, touching the scar.  
  
“You’re fucking pulling my leg.”  
  
“I’m not.”  
  
One look and he can tell that Dom is serious about this. He isn’t lying at all.  
  
“You’ve only seen the scar? Did you see the mark too?” Matt asks in a low voice, leaning in close to Dom to keep the conversation only between themselves.  
  
To that, Dom makes a face, and Matt feels that tinge of disappointment that came. “He was wearing a jumper and a shirt. I couldn’t see the mark where it should be.”  
  
Matt groans, throwing his stub away.  
  
“What the fuck Dom!” he swears. “Just because we have similar looking scars on our fucking necks doesn’t mean that he might be the one!”  
  
“But he might be!”  
  
“That’s just pulling the fucking bar of expectations too high!”  
  
“Maybe you'll find out when you meet him,” Dom attempts to reason at him. “Have a chat and then just sort of say that you two might be soulmates because of the scars on your necks and then show off your marks. Should be pretty straightforward.”  
  
“That’s not as straightforward as it seems, Dom.”  
  
Dom gives a shrug.  
  
“You’ll be seeing him soon anyways. You can find out on your own.”  
  
And Dom chose to say that right when they’re going to have Coldplay as their supporting act for their upcoming tour. ‘Fuck’ is not the worst swear word that Matt has in is vocabulary, but it’s the first one that comes into mind to respond to the upcoming events.  
  
\-----  
  
It’s hard to ignore it during the tour. Matt watches the singer of Coldplay from a distance. He can see the scar, but not his mark.   
  
Dom is right, it does looks very similar to his own.   
  
He wants to be hopeful but he reins the excitement back in. How can he be sure that he’s the one just because Dom claims that their scars look alike?  
  
Once Dom told him about Chris, suddenly Matt isn’t comfortable with letting the people know what’s on his bare neck and collarbone, moreso for Chris to see it. In fact, Matt was covering his scar and mark the day he got up close enough to the other lead singer for a chat to see the taller man’s scar properly.  
  
A part of him for some reason really hopes that the blond man might be the one. But with no sight of the mark, it’s what’s keeping him held back from jumping on the other lead singer and calling to tell his family that he’d found his soulmate.  
  
High-collared shirts and scarves can easily keep his neck obscured. Makeup works just as well in hiding the scar and the mark, even if a couple of girls tutted at him while applying it on his neck and collarbone for wanting to hide them.   
  
Unfortunately for Dom, and fortunately for Matt, the brunette didn’t get the chance to confront Chris about it once the tour is over. He felt disappointed, yet at the same time relieved, because he wasn’t that ready to find out whether or not he is his soulmate yet.   
  
But apparently, Dom doesn't agree with that and isn’t letting him off the hook by setting up a party and inviting some people and other bands, including Coldplay, over to their place.  
  
“Are you _insane_ , Dom? This is a stupid plan.”  
  
“No, I’m not,” Dom huffs. He points a finger at Matt. “You, on the other hand, _are_ insane for letting him go. You know that I’m setting up the party just for you to make sure that you’re not going to miss your second chance.”  
  
“It’s not like I’ll never see him again,” Matt says dismissively.  
  
Dom lets out a harsh ‘Hah!’, shaking his head.  
  
“That’s what you like to think. Take your time. Dilly-dally around to build up the courage you need to do the big reveal on him. Next thing you know—Bam! It'll be a decade before you see each other again.”  
  
Matt rolls his eyes. “There’s no way that will happ—”  
  
“And most likely married. With _kids_ ,” Dom stresses the last word.  
  
Matt stays quiet at that. That thought never came to mind, of never seeing each other for years and Chris finding someone else to settle down with on the way, and now that Dom said it, that’s even _more_ terrifying of a prospect to encounter.  
  
“Why are you working so hard into getting me to meet him?” he asks quietly.  
  
Dom doesn’t answer back at first. Only when he looks at Matt with his grey eyes did he give his answer.  
  
“Because you deserve to know,” Dom says with a serious tone under his voice. “To know what it’s like to reveal yourself to him. We all deserve a chance at it, to meet our other half, our soulmate, and find out where it all goes from there. If you let him go, without even taking the chance, it may not be the worst mistake to be done by you, but it’s a mistake that you can never take back no matter how regretful you feel about it.”  
  
If Matt had been sitting down, he would be squirming on his seat.  
  
In amongst their schoolmates, Dom is the one who rarely speaks about the prospect of meeting his soulmate. Most of the time, he casually laughs it off when someone asks him about it, and most of them learned to respect his wishes in why he won’t talk about it. It is his own private information, but from the emotions that Dom showed through his looks and his words, it spoke more than enough that he _does_ want what his friends have gotten, to the point that it’s expressed by how much he wants his best friend to reveal himself to his soulmate despite what the drummer is going through with himself.  
  
\-----  
  
Still, it doesn't mean that Matt is all that ready to bare his mark out to the world.  
  
“You fucking idiot.”  
  
“Shut up.”  
  
“Of all the days that you decided to be self-conscious of your scar and mark, it had to be the day that I set up the party where the two of you will see each other.”  
  
“It's not an uncommon thing. Not everyone wants to show off their marks when they feel like it.”  
  
“Yeah, wearing a fucking turtleneck when it’s summer is _totally_ not suspicious at all.”  
  
“Think of it as a surprise then! Don’t let him know until we get him to a room and we’re sure that he’s the one.”  
  
Dom quirks an eyebrow.  
  
“If you say so.”  
  
Matt should have known that he should have been careful for what he said.  
  
The party is in Dom’s standards, made to be a good one. With lots of people, lots of booze, lots of music to pick from, and an overall great atmosphere in the flat. It was easy for Dom to drag Matt towards where Chris is and the three of them to start up a chat.   
  
Slowly, Dom manages to maneuver them into one of their bedrooms, claiming that they need a quiet place to hear each other better than from the noise of the crowd and music. While Matt is all too well aware that it’s part of Dom’s plan, Chris isn’t and is just following them to what is more than obvious to be Matt’s bedroom.   
  
All the while, his mind is freaking out at the potential soulmate who is right next to him, unaware of the significance of what's going on and how he is _so_ not ready for this.  
  
They were still talking about mundane matters when Dom shifted the topic by looking at Chris’ neck.  
  
“You got a wicked looking scar there. How did you get it?”  
  
Chris gives a grin, rubbing his neck.  
  
“I prefer not to say. It’s pretty embarrassing to tell.”  
  
“And I still want to find out.”  
  
“You can try, but I’m keeping mum no matter what.”  
  
Dom grimaces for a bit before he sits back and shrugs.   
  
“Well then, I won’t bother you about that if you don’t want to. I wanted to ask you about it since Matt has one on his neck as well.”  
  
“Is that why he’s wearing a turtleneck shirt? Did it recently happened?” Chris asks, looking concerned.   
  
Matt musters up a glare at the both of them for talking about his choice of attire.  
  
Dom grins, the opening now there for him to pounce at it.  
  
“It’s been there as long as I’ve known him. Kind of looks like yours when I look at it.”  
  
That gave the effect. Chris is silent, looking at the two of them in disbelief.  
  
“Really?”   
  
Matt is playing with a loose string on his shirt until Dom gives him an elbow jab and a glare, giving him no choice in matter of whether to show his scar or not. He stands up and pulls the collar down, low enough to see the scar and the mark up close, and Chris’ eyes widened. The blond man gets up from the chair he was sitting on and moves closer towards Matt.  
  
“Wait,” Matt quickly puts his hands up, stopping Chris in his place. “Not until I see your mark.”  
  
Chris doesn’t hesitate in showing his to Matt. And Dom’s hunch has been right the whole time. Below the scar, is where Chris’ soulmate mark is. A flock of flying birds on his left collarbone in a horizontal V-shape, seven in total, just like his own.  
  
“It really is you,” Matt whispers, disbelieved at what he’s seeing.  
  
“Well, I’m going to leave the two of you alone,” Dom says, leaving the room as quickly and silently as possible.  
  
They look at one another, unsure of what to say, of what to ask. Looking at Chris, there’s not much from his facial expression to tell what he’s feeling, but his eyes are a different matter. Those blue eyes are showing emotions too intense for Matt to handle. Instead his gaze falls back on the scar. He’d seen it a few times by now, but there’s that one thing that he had never done before, and now is the opportunity to do it.  
  
“Can… Can I touch it?”  
  
Chris blinked, snapping out of the reverie he was in.  
  
“Y-You can.”  
  
Matt has his hand pulled up towards Chris’ neck. Once he’s near to the scar, he hesitated for a moment before his fingers gently touch it.  
  
It’s the same, yet a lot different to the one he has. Touching the scar, he can feel that the lines are more prominent, where the tissues have either sunk down or rise up over some parts. It feels _real_. It feels as though the impact that he has finally found his soulmate has only struck him now. Is this how Chris and Kelly felt when they found each other?  
  
It’s finally now that he can ask the very question that has been in his mind for years.   
  
“What happened?” Matt asks, finally pulling his hand away.  
  
Chris stays quiet for a bit, the apple on his throat bobbing before he answers the question that has haunted Matt since he was ten.  
  
“I had a surgery to remove a lump on my neck when I was a kid. The surgery was quite a botched one, so that left me with the scar that I have… That you have.”  
  
Half of Matt wanted to act incredulous over why Chris made such a big deal previously in hiding the reason behind what happened to him. The other half wanted to laugh hysterically. So it was a botched surgery that gave birth to the existence of the scar that they both have.   
  
“My mum and dad knew that it was going to freak out my soulmate when I got the scar near to where my mark is. They were really upset at the doctor who did it to me since the scar would affect you as well and they threatened to sue him and stuff and—” Chris stops rambling once he realises that Matt is looking overwhelmed by what he said. “Wh—What did you think happened to me?”  
  
“I assumed the worst. Like someone cut you on the neck and you somehow survived to tell.”  
  
Chris laughs. “If that was what happened to me as a kid, that would have been a much more badass story to tell.”  
  
Matt chuckles, shaking his head at the image of a young Chris, with other kids in his age surrounding him, looking at him and his scar in awe of such a story to tell.  
  
Then suddenly Chris pulls him into a tight hug.   
  
“I’m so sorry.”   
  
Matt blinks, confused over the sudden hug and apology.  
  
“Why?”   
  
“I must've hurt you all these years. Is that why you avoided me the past few weeks?” he murmurs. Oh fuck, so he had noticed what Matt has been doing. His arms are wrapped tight around Matt and it doesn't feel as though he'll let go anytime soon.  
  
“You didn't,” Matt says. “You didn’t hurt me at all.”  
  
“But I still did. With the surgery and all that, I…” Matt can hear Chris’ voice starting to sound ragged. Oh god, is he crying? “I always thought that my soulmate wouldn’t want to meet me, thinking that I hurt them and wanted to reject them. But I didn’t. I swear I didn’t. Christ, you must've been eleven or something.”  
  
Matt simply stands there, not sure of what to say or do. A moment ago they just finally confirmed to one another that they’re soulmates, and now Chris is very upset at himself and Matt had only just found out what sort of deep seated issue he has been having for years. Oh god, he can even feel the larger man’s body shaking. It’s more than obvious that he’s overwhelmed by it all.  
  
“I was ten,” Matt corrects him, pulling a hand up to wipe the tears now on Chris’ face. “But you didn't. You didn’t hurt me at all.”  
  
Standing there, hugging Chris and consoling him, something about what Chris had said made Matt feel bad. While he was fine with living with the scar over the years, it’s clear that Chris wasn’t. And shockingly enough, he knows why.   
  
Back when he was obsessive over learning about soulmate marks, Matt had encountered in a couple of books of the topic about scars that mysteriously appear on or near a soulmate mark, about how the area surrounding a mark can physically alter itself from the actions of one soulmate to the other.  
  
When there are scars that appeared either over the mark or near it, it can be taken as a sign of a soulmate rejecting their other half and never wanting to meet them. While there were cases that have shown that the scars were accidental, caused by circumstances outside of a person’s control, there were also documented cases of some people who deliberately burned their skin or cut themselves in order to show to their soulmate, no matter where they are, that their other half have chosen to refuse them.  
  
And Chris thought that Matt had mistaken the surgical scar as a sign of rejection.  
  
How long was he bothered by the scar on his neck, possibly even hated it whenever he looked at it on a mirror or touched it with his hands? If he were in Chris’ shoes when he got the scar, rather than the copy of it, he would have felt worried over the consequences, guilty at something that he had no control over, and feared for the worst as well.  
  
And Chris had seen him around for weeks now, never having seen his scar or mark the whole time he talked to Matt or hung out with his bandmates because he had hidden it.  
  
Suddenly, Matt feels stupid for having done what he’d done.   
  
Looking at Chris, at how shocked he was at first at hearing that Matt is his soulmate, at how joyful and excited that he’d finally found his other half, and then at how much guilt he has held over the years of what he thought the scar might have done to the brunette, something inside of him snapped and he responds to it.  
  
Matt wasn’t planning on kissing him, because what the hell, he had finally confirmed that this guy is his soulmate and even Chris didn’t kiss Kelly until after a couple of dates just to be sure. But he needed a way to get him to stop feeling guilty of himself over something he had no control over.   
  
He keeps Chris’ lips close to his own, pulling away briefly only to push back, hoping that each pecking kiss can quiet down the blond man, to soothe the pain and guilt that ate at him for years. Once he started, however, Matt finds himself unable to stop. It didn’t matter that he is kissing a guy, there’s just something about this moment, this person that he is kissing that makes him not want to stop until then. The universe decided to have him be his soulmate, and there is a lot more that Matt has to know of him before he leaps, long after his instinct did.  
  
For now, all Matt knows is that what he is doing is not a mistake.  
  
He stops kissing him once he feels that Chris is no longer shaking. Staring at his blue eyes, it’s not so overwhelming anymore. Looking at him, he feels as though his heart is melting. Fuck, he fell for this guy faster than the speed of sound. Maybe even faster than that.  
  
“Feel better now?” he asks softly.  
  
Chris nods.  
  
“And for the record, I loved having the scar. I never thought of it as a sign of rejection. I just thought that it looked pretty cool to have it on me.”  
  
That finally gets the blond to let out a chuckle, giving Matt a brief, squeezing hug.  
  
“I’m sorry for overreacting,” he says. “I didn’t picture that this would happen in meeting my soulmate for the first time, getting kissed to calm me down.”  
  
“Me neither,” Matt says. “But it did stopped you from freaking out and to hear me out.”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
They lean their heads to each other and let their foreheads touch, still in a hug and barely wanting to part anytime soon.  
  
“Can we… can we kiss again?” Chris requests.  
  
Matt grins.  
  
“Sure.”  
  
When they kissed for the second time, this time it isn’t a one-sided affair. There’s no tongue involved for now, they’re simply feeling the touch of one another. From feel of their lips, to the way their noses bumped to each other, and how warm and comfortable it is to envelop themselves in each other’s arms.  
  
If this is what kissing your own soulmate feels like, kissing will never feel the same for Matt when done with other people from now on. Maybe it’ll even extend onto other activities as well.  
  
“So are you two planning for a date yet, or just going straight to the conclusion?” Dom’s voice cuts in.  
  
  
END

**Author's Note:**

> In case you wanted to know if Chris Martin really does have such a scar or not, here's the [picture](http://68.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m0n36uNSLV1rnzus8o1_500.jpg) proof of it and the [story](http://www.1057thepoint.com/news/music-news/coldplay-singer-talks-favorite-scar-strangest-place-he-ever-woke) behind the scar.


End file.
